The Berlin Accent by sarahandgareth
Even seasoned German speakers may find themselves disoriented on a first visit to Berlin, for the local accent is quite different to that heard in Hamburg or Frankfurt (themselves quite different!). While modern French may have been substantially homogenized, German is still well-known for its dialects, and Berlinisch is certainly alive, if not kicking quite as vigorously as was once the case. Locals use plenty of phrases and pronunciations that can be confusing: ‘ich’ might be transformed into ‘icke’ while ‘das’ might become ‘det’. The ‘g’ sound in words like ‘ganz’ sounds more like a German ‘j’, and even the simple ‘nein’ is almost always rendered ‘nee’ in casual speech.
And that’s not even counting the local words. The one the average visitor is most likely to encounter – and be confused by – is ‘Schrippe’, when in a bakery, say, or when ordering a sausage. The word is simply the Berlin version of ‘Broetchen’, the German word for a small bread roll!
If you really fall for the language, you can even find an Asterix book in Berlinisch in many local shops!
